1 00:01:06,05 --> 00:01:11,19 Thank you for her 2 00:01:11,24 --> 00:01:18,11 thank you. Aloha and welcome to the story short 3 00:01:18,16 --> 00:01:23,66 show I'm Shawn McLaughlin executive director here at Access humble and this program 4 00:01:23,67 --> 00:01:28,91 is one of our series of shows we do as part of our media lab project and I really 5 00:01:28,92 --> 00:01:29,58 want to give 6 00:01:29,59 --> 00:01:33,99 a shout out to Matt Knight who's the producer and organizer of the media lab 7 00:01:34,03 --> 00:01:35,20 project who you've all had 8 00:01:35,21 --> 00:01:42,74 a chance to meet so let's hear from him thank you. For 9 00:01:42,75 --> 00:01:48,17 this show we're going to feature short stories and prose from five local authors so 10 00:01:48,18 --> 00:01:54,39 get ready to be delighted by their diminutive tales leading off the show is Jeff to 11 00:01:54,40 --> 00:02:01,26 Mark Jeff started doing shows mixing poetry stories and music in Madison Wisconsin 12 00:02:01,50 --> 00:02:06,41 cafes bars and art galleries back in one nine hundred seventy four and he's just 13 00:02:06,42 --> 00:02:12,58 kept going. He's written five theatrical storytelling shows including writing my 14 00:02:12,59 --> 00:02:19,35 way out of adolescence and went to lunch never returned debuting 15 00:02:19,36 --> 00:02:24,73 three of them at Del are to Mad River Festival and touring them widely Let's 16 00:02:24,74 --> 00:02:26,39 welcome Jeff to Mark. 17 00:02:33,91 --> 00:02:36,84 Thank you very much John I'm going to do 18 00:02:37,17 --> 00:02:43,20 a story about my mother and her name was Geraldine O'BRIEN And then she took to 19 00:02:43,21 --> 00:02:49,03 Mark and this is from her obituary she died seven years ago 20 00:02:50,43 --> 00:02:55,44 she was classy glamorous in the life of the party recently she said I've lived 21 00:02:55,45 --> 00:03:01,61 a colorful life and she certainly did she enjoyed golf in the playing cards 22 00:03:01,62 --> 00:03:07,97 especially bridge and cooking for family she loved music the horse races 23 00:03:08,12 --> 00:03:13,85 a good bargain and the Chicago Cubs above all she devoted her life to her family 24 00:03:14,17 --> 00:03:20,38 and treasured time spent with her children and grandchildren her family will always 25 00:03:20,39 --> 00:03:26,67 remember her humor her ability to laugh at her own foibles her fierce loyalty 26 00:03:27,21 --> 00:03:32,92 and of course her flair for the dramatic she will be deeply missed 27 00:03:34,49 --> 00:03:41,47 and she has been. My mother was without doubt the hairdo queen 28 00:03:41,48 --> 00:03:48,01 of Racine Wisconsin she had this bouncin bouffant of hair that defied 29 00:03:48,02 --> 00:03:54,89 gravity the true eighth wonder of the world and somehow in every kind of weather or 30 00:03:54,90 --> 00:04:01,77 situation she kept up that silver tinted cotton candy cone of hair her entire 31 00:04:01,81 --> 00:04:08,41 life. And her hair could hypnotize you it had magic 32 00:04:08,42 --> 00:04:12,84 power swirling around inside it that if you looked at it too long you could be 33 00:04:12,85 --> 00:04:16,12 swept through a trapdoor and transported to 34 00:04:16,13 --> 00:04:22,00 a different epoch of time and space I know because it happened to me 35 00:04:22,82 --> 00:04:28,49 least twice. And her hair was something you could depend on something that was 36 00:04:28,53 --> 00:04:34,65 always there and in fact two days before she died she had her hair done up 37 00:04:34,66 --> 00:04:40,18 perfectly and I think she figured you never know whom you might meet on the other 38 00:04:40,19 --> 00:04:46,98 side. Now I always thought my mom was the missing link in the famed Rat Pack 39 00:04:46,99 --> 00:04:51,69 swingers of the fifty's and sixty's and she would have been right at home with Dean 40 00:04:51,70 --> 00:04:56,69 Martin and Angie Dickinson and Frank Sinatra trick and highballs and singin all 41 00:04:56,70 --> 00:05:01,49 night long and she dressed for the part she always had these fashionable dresses 42 00:05:01,50 --> 00:05:06,71 and these kind of flamboyant jewelry her hair done up perfectly and in all kinds of 43 00:05:06,78 --> 00:05:12,34 meth makeup and everything. But my parents actually took their house in Racine 44 00:05:12,35 --> 00:05:15,37 Wisconsin and they had their own kind a little rat pack of but 45 00:05:15,38 --> 00:05:19,71 a whole different kind of level of it and invite all the friends over and they'd 46 00:05:19,72 --> 00:05:24,87 hang out drinking highballs drinking beers singing and my mom would pull out 47 00:05:24,88 --> 00:05:26,67 a little ukulele and she had 48 00:05:26,68 --> 00:05:31,77 a beautiful voice and she harmonized with her good friend Bob Smith and they would 49 00:05:31,78 --> 00:05:35,00 sing things like for the good times and going to take 50 00:05:35,01 --> 00:05:41,60 a sentimental journey and I remember I would go to bed and they would keep us up 51 00:05:41,64 --> 00:05:46,36 half the night baby till three in the morning but I never really got Max I thought 52 00:05:46,56 --> 00:05:50,72 with all that laughter and happiness coming out of the kitchen from these old 53 00:05:50,73 --> 00:05:52,54 people maybe it wouldn't be 54 00:05:52,55 --> 00:05:59,24 a bad thing to get old myself but one thing my mother was not was 55 00:05:59,25 --> 00:06:06,21 a naturalist my brother Paul once said to her mom. If we were going camping and my 56 00:06:06,22 --> 00:06:13,11 mother said Do you remember camping. And he said no I don't actually 57 00:06:13,37 --> 00:06:15,25 she says Do you have remember having 58 00:06:15,26 --> 00:06:21,65 a picnic or eating outside. And he said. I guess I don't 59 00:06:22,39 --> 00:06:29,26 she says you know why and he said why is among I hate bugs I hate every one of 60 00:06:29,27 --> 00:06:35,98 them I can't stand the sight of them that's why we eat indoors. So I came home one 61 00:06:35,99 --> 00:06:39,88 time I was in my twenty's and someone had thrown 62 00:06:39,89 --> 00:06:43,55 a blanket on an air conditioner just haphazardly through it there and didn't take 63 00:06:43,56 --> 00:06:45,17 it off for months and 64 00:06:45,18 --> 00:06:50,72 a beehive grew inside of this blanket and one day these bees came through the air 65 00:06:50,73 --> 00:06:55,77 conditioner and stung my mother totally terrorizing and freaking are out and she 66 00:06:55,78 --> 00:07:01,10 barricaded herself in her bedroom so I knocked on the door she said. There's bees 67 00:07:01,11 --> 00:07:04,89 in the house you have got to kill them you have got to kill every single one of 68 00:07:04,90 --> 00:07:09,92 them I cannot live like this I said well how am I supposed to kill them Mom says go 69 00:07:09,93 --> 00:07:15,52 to the hardware store get some spray I don't know but do it so I enlisted my friend 70 00:07:15,56 --> 00:07:19,77 and you to salvo in the battle of the bees we got two cans of B. 71 00:07:19,78 --> 00:07:22,48 Death spray we snuck up he had 72 00:07:22,49 --> 00:07:28,26 a rake he pulled that blanket out and the bees came swarming out of we both started 73 00:07:28,27 --> 00:07:33,73 spraying wildly backed up and one of the house and my mother was here did you kill 74 00:07:33,74 --> 00:07:39,25 them did you kill the bees I said Yes I think so what do you mean you think so did 75 00:07:39,26 --> 00:07:44,12 you kill them I said yes we killed all of them and she said that bring me the dead 76 00:07:44,13 --> 00:07:48,87 bodies. Which is 77 00:07:48,88 --> 00:07:55,49 a famous line from our family ever since then. So that was my mother hairdo 78 00:07:55,53 --> 00:08:02,45 queen and anti naturalists Supreme. One time 79 00:08:02,46 --> 00:08:06,69 when I was in about twenty five years old. And I was sitting in the living room 80 00:08:06,70 --> 00:08:07,42 with my mother 81 00:08:08,06 --> 00:08:13,85 a fire blazing and my mom says she's got this leopard print bathrobe was matching 82 00:08:13,86 --> 00:08:19,63 slippers. Her hair is done up perfectly. She's smoking 83 00:08:19,64 --> 00:08:22,96 a long parliament and she looks for all the world like 84 00:08:22,97 --> 00:08:26,23 a lounge lizard version of the old actress on Livia to have 85 00:08:26,24 --> 00:08:32,95 a line and as she's smoking or parliament she says Jeff you got into that marijuana 86 00:08:32,96 --> 00:08:39,93 and. I said why she says I'd like to try it I said Oh you're kidding mom 87 00:08:39,97 --> 00:08:46,43 says you know I'd like to try I want to see what's the big deal and I said yeah I 88 00:08:46,44 --> 00:08:51,87 got some but I don't want to give it to you why not I said because it's different 89 00:08:51,88 --> 00:08:55,100 than drinking or something I've seen people get very weird and you might freak out 90 00:08:56,04 --> 00:09:00,78 of I'm not going to freak out just to come and I said no Mom let's see you to get 91 00:09:00,79 --> 00:09:04,67 weird I have to bring in the hospital can you see the headlines in Racine Journal 92 00:09:04,68 --> 00:09:06,36 Times son of 93 00:09:06,37 --> 00:09:13,10 a local dentist arrested for giving mother marijuana she says Don't be silly go 94 00:09:13,11 --> 00:09:19,02 upstairs and get your marijuana for your mother please so I go upstairs I get this 95 00:09:19,03 --> 00:09:24,22 brown railroad ditch Mexican weed I have one of those little rolling machines and 96 00:09:24,23 --> 00:09:28,76 I'm rolling it up and my sister who is seventeen comes home members just put it 97 00:09:28,77 --> 00:09:34,93 away. And she looks at my sister and her most serious I'm your mother voice 98 00:09:35,27 --> 00:09:42,16 Rhea what would you think if your mother smoked marijuana and my 99 00:09:42,17 --> 00:09:48,26 sister said I don't care she says Jeff rolled it up. So I roll it up. 100 00:09:49,56 --> 00:09:50,65 And she starts kicking 101 00:09:50,66 --> 00:09:55,02 a couple of drags but she's doing it as if she's smoking one of her parliaments she 102 00:09:55,03 --> 00:09:58,22 says I knew this was stupid I know this business is not 103 00:09:58,23 --> 00:10:02,34 a big deal I thought what is wrong with you kids why don't you just have 104 00:10:02,35 --> 00:10:07,33 a couple drinks and be sociable instead of smoking this stuff and sitting around 105 00:10:07,34 --> 00:10:07,49 like 106 00:10:07,50 --> 00:10:13,42 a bunch of potted plants and I said. You're not doing it right you got to take it 107 00:10:13,83 --> 00:10:20,25 and hold it in OK so she OK to it. And then she takes this big. 108 00:10:22,24 --> 00:10:22,93 And she looks like 109 00:10:22,94 --> 00:10:29,00 a puffer fish would have cared too and she lets it out and she starts laughing she 110 00:10:29,01 --> 00:10:33,25 goes oh my God this is what it is oh my god I feel like I'm on 111 00:10:33,26 --> 00:10:39,11 a roller coaster and she's rolling down the couch I said yes mom this is it oh my 112 00:10:39,23 --> 00:10:41,05 goodness so she's less of 113 00:10:41,06 --> 00:10:47,07 a parliament and she's sitting in the corner of the couch and she looks at me with 114 00:10:47,08 --> 00:10:54,03 the steel gray eyes and says. You know I never realized just how 115 00:10:54,04 --> 00:10:54,58 heavy 116 00:10:54,91 --> 00:11:01,55 a secure red is in fact I don't even know how I can lift this I said Mom 117 00:11:02,12 --> 00:11:03,12 it's still just 118 00:11:03,13 --> 00:11:07,37 a cigarette your goal or it's just the marijuana is and I suggest oh and she 119 00:11:07,38 --> 00:11:14,19 started laughing began and then she says you know I'm 120 00:11:14,20 --> 00:11:20,81 so small you could just put me in your hand. And walk me up 121 00:11:20,82 --> 00:11:27,58 stairs and drop me on on your pillow on my pillow could too. I said Mom 122 00:11:27,75 --> 00:11:32,09 you're still one hundred thirty pounds she got zero zero zero is the very want 123 00:11:32,10 --> 00:11:37,19 isn't it and she starts laughing so loud her hair is going back and forth and I'm 124 00:11:37,20 --> 00:11:39,14 looking at my sister that going 125 00:11:39,15 --> 00:11:46,02 a little worried I said mom mom you might wake dad up on Had be terrible it's 126 00:11:46,03 --> 00:11:50,02 just like us when we were in high school I said Mom just we'll give you 127 00:11:50,03 --> 00:11:54,91 a little bit of gin and you can stay your trumpet OK So she takes a couple sips 128 00:11:54,92 --> 00:12:00,05 a churn and she's very happy my brother knocks on the front door and brother Mike 129 00:12:00,06 --> 00:12:06,51 and I go to the front door and I see. Mike mom stoned what I said it's 130 00:12:06,52 --> 00:12:13,31 a long start she says so he comes walking into them and my mother goes Hi 131 00:12:13,32 --> 00:12:20,23 Mike I'm I'm high on marijuana and bikes and yes I've heard she says where 132 00:12:20,27 --> 00:12:24,75 were if you been Mike and Mike says well I just came from Madison I saw Peter 133 00:12:24,76 --> 00:12:30,92 Yarrow from Peter Paul and Mary and my mother sat up she goes oh yes I can see them 134 00:12:31,35 --> 00:12:35,76 there's three of them there walking across mean street they're all in clown outfits 135 00:12:35,85 --> 00:12:40,45 yes it's Peter Paul and Mary and she stopped in mid-sentence and started laughing 136 00:12:40,46 --> 00:12:47,44 again I was like oh my God she's having full hallucinations and I said mom I 137 00:12:47,45 --> 00:12:52,12 think it's time for you to have another little drink of gin just to bring you down 138 00:12:52,13 --> 00:12:52,42 just 139 00:12:52,43 --> 00:12:57,85 a little bit she says Do you think I need to come down I kind of like it up here I 140 00:12:57,86 --> 00:12:59,68 said I think it's just 141 00:12:59,69 --> 00:13:05,94 a little bit OK so she yelled gin and the pot started wearing off and she 142 00:13:06,20 --> 00:13:12,21 practically floated up stairs humming as she went up the next morning we waited for 143 00:13:12,22 --> 00:13:16,66 her we wondered how she would be after such 144 00:13:16,67 --> 00:13:23,53 a wild night like that. We started descending the stairs she had these brand 145 00:13:23,54 --> 00:13:28,34 new red high heels nylons a red dress with 146 00:13:28,35 --> 00:13:33,75 a black belt make up her hair done up perfectly maybe 147 00:13:33,76 --> 00:13:40,39 a little inch higher than yesterday. And I said Mom how do you feel she says oh I 148 00:13:40,40 --> 00:13:43,72 feel good I feel really good but you know I feel 149 00:13:43,73 --> 00:13:48,23 a little ticklish inside you know what I mean and I said Yeah I know exactly what 150 00:13:48,24 --> 00:13:54,78 you mean but you know what I'd like I would really like to hear some music that's 151 00:13:54,79 --> 00:14:00,14 what I like so I went over the big stereo counsel I put on the greatest hits of 152 00:14:00,15 --> 00:14:06,49 Patsy Cline and sure oh yes that's exactly what I'd like to hear and so 153 00:14:06,97 --> 00:14:12,82 she started like gliding around the living room and dancing and singing and the 154 00:14:12,83 --> 00:14:19,76 snow was falling outside and maybe it's my imagination but my mom looked 155 00:14:19,86 --> 00:14:25,53 younger and lighter that day I mean not light enough for me to carry or in my hand 156 00:14:26,19 --> 00:14:32,74 but beautiful and at ease and about as happy as I'd ever seen or as she say. 157 00:14:35,15 --> 00:14:41,85 Fall to pieces. Each time I see the. 158 00:14:46,55 --> 00:14:51,36 THANK YOU THANK YOU 159 00:14:51,37 --> 00:14:56,33 THANK YOU THANK YOU. 160 00:14:58,39 --> 00:15:02,75 The next writer is Margo's ganger Margaret Jarvis Gaynor is 161 00:15:02,76 --> 00:15:09,61 a poet photographer videographer wife and mother of two retired video and print 162 00:15:09,62 --> 00:15:15,18 media teacher you can find her poems in the humble county library or in back issues 163 00:15:15,19 --> 00:15:15,77 of H.S. 164 00:15:15,78 --> 00:15:22,95 Use Toyin or hear her read them on Tuesday nights at work humbled in Arcadia shift 165 00:15:22,96 --> 00:15:28,00 happens breakdowns during life's long hauls published in two thousand and eighteen 166 00:15:28,64 --> 00:15:35,48 is her debut memoir. Thank you. 167 00:15:37,28 --> 00:15:43,91 Thank you. That was superb Jef demarc he has this 168 00:15:43,92 --> 00:15:50,30 great. Piece called Writing my way out of adolescence so I'm 169 00:15:50,31 --> 00:15:56,64 titling this tonight I brought six poems and I'm titling at writing my way out of 170 00:15:56,65 --> 00:16:03,61 the mother daughter complex. This first piece has been in my heart for 171 00:16:03,62 --> 00:16:08,46 all these years is cause the art of holding still 172 00:16:12,34 --> 00:16:15,22 Yesterday my daughter earned 173 00:16:15,23 --> 00:16:22,09 a dollar painting my face her hands up to my eyes over and 174 00:16:22,19 --> 00:16:29,01 over with purple water like ribbons streaming down droplets pouring 175 00:16:29,02 --> 00:16:35,95 off or wrists streaking her forearm splattering unnoticed to an end 176 00:16:36,68 --> 00:16:42,94 in the carpet. Hand and I let it all happen her eyes were so 177 00:16:42,95 --> 00:16:45,21 clear in my eyes 178 00:16:45,77 --> 00:16:52,58 a child of God creating miracles on this hard face with the softest innocent 179 00:16:53,15 --> 00:16:59,77 wild love paintings imagine clearly right behind her eyes she carried them 180 00:16:59,81 --> 00:17:06,35 out through little fingers to me Who noticed her method and 181 00:17:06,36 --> 00:17:08,08 quietly prayed for 182 00:17:08,09 --> 00:17:14,57 a rainbow carpet memory of my face smoothed out soft as 183 00:17:14,58 --> 00:17:21,46 a peach pit stuck in my throat still less than twelve inches from her 184 00:17:21,47 --> 00:17:28,31 breath on my cheeks bright eyes and wild love painting sitting in my lap. 185 00:17:29,83 --> 00:17:35,88 Pointed to her and we. Could not smear her professional work 186 00:17:36,68 --> 00:17:37,50 consigned for 187 00:17:37,51 --> 00:17:44,20 a dollar this raising of children the art of holding 188 00:17:44,21 --> 00:17:44,71 still. 189 00:17:51,91 --> 00:17:58,63 My children never quit moving and this poem is about that and we took them 190 00:17:58,64 --> 00:18:04,37 backpacking a lot when they were growing up and I wrote this. On 191 00:18:04,38 --> 00:18:11,14 a backpacking trip to move 192 00:18:11,15 --> 00:18:17,43 without children is to fall into the full moon rising 193 00:18:17,59 --> 00:18:19,63 sleeping all night on 194 00:18:19,64 --> 00:18:26,17 a rock and waking alone beside the lake. To move without 195 00:18:26,21 --> 00:18:33,13 children is to hear the water to stabilize on the rock receive the 196 00:18:33,14 --> 00:18:39,69 chipmunk on my shoes and the goldfinch burrowing in my hair to move without 197 00:18:39,84 --> 00:18:45,86 children is to listen. To the earth air water 198 00:18:45,87 --> 00:18:52,55 a lie down there speaking through trees and to move without children is to speak 199 00:18:52,67 --> 00:18:59,18 back to those trees of my heart that is moving with children 200 00:18:59,83 --> 00:19:02,27 ever so slowly in 201 00:19:02,28 --> 00:19:08,65 a constant dance that borders quiet moments and makes them 202 00:19:08,69 --> 00:19:15,23 rare but to move with my son is to build 203 00:19:15,24 --> 00:19:21,23 a man with his first brook trout ten inches over the open fire on 204 00:19:21,24 --> 00:19:27,92 a stick his childhood memory cutting away mine and to move with my 205 00:19:27,93 --> 00:19:34,57 daughter her rocks and straw in the camera her words in my hand 206 00:19:34,58 --> 00:19:40,84 writing her voice in my dreams to move with my daughter 207 00:19:41,41 --> 00:19:42,39 is to make 208 00:19:42,50 --> 00:19:49,42 a woman in both of us. We hike in the morning noisy 209 00:19:49,43 --> 00:19:56,21 children warning the deer granite boulders like satin dreams coming true 210 00:19:56,22 --> 00:20:02,89 before us the rocks fall out from underneath my children but we're holding him and 211 00:20:03,68 --> 00:20:10,12 my eyes water throw us for both sides of this life 212 00:20:10,76 --> 00:20:14,33 that is moving moving through me in the small. 213 00:20:18,34 --> 00:20:24,82 It occurred to me that the metaphor of cutting your apron strings might be 214 00:20:24,83 --> 00:20:31,21 outdated and not everybody would understand cutting the apron strings and so. 215 00:20:32,39 --> 00:20:32,74 When 216 00:20:32,75 --> 00:20:38,48 a little kid is hanging on to their mother and the mother is loving them and caring 217 00:20:38,49 --> 00:20:43,30 for them and protecting them and the and the little kid hangs on to the apron 218 00:20:43,31 --> 00:20:49,99 strings and hangs on and then pretty soon the little kid lets go and becomes an 219 00:20:50,00 --> 00:20:56,39 autonomy as individual as should be and sometimes 220 00:20:56,90 --> 00:21:02,82 cutting the apron strings when that happens they bleed and this poem is called 221 00:21:03,03 --> 00:21:09,64 apron strings some daughters cut him 222 00:21:09,65 --> 00:21:12,48 clean quick like when 223 00:21:12,49 --> 00:21:17,44 a bandaid gets ripped off all at once hurts like hell heals 224 00:21:18,94 --> 00:21:22,70 others take years decades like 225 00:21:22,71 --> 00:21:28,66 a timed exposure waiting for the bandaid to fall off it might be hidden in 226 00:21:29,63 --> 00:21:33,32 behind a smile or never enough food or 227 00:21:33,33 --> 00:21:39,97 a drawer full of candy. Handful of women will wait 228 00:21:40,27 --> 00:21:43,42 till law after their mother dies 229 00:21:44,05 --> 00:21:50,49 a legacy to be nice stopping all their poems about Africa. 230 00:21:51,78 --> 00:21:58,66 Mine was an unraveling of burlap pieces of string everywhere stuck 231 00:21:58,67 --> 00:22:05,49 in the carpet in the vacuum in the soles of our shoes like gossamer 232 00:22:05,93 --> 00:22:10,20 disintegrating in slow motion our decay 233 00:22:10,34 --> 00:22:17,15 a residue of silence dusting all the memories of powdery why in 234 00:22:17,16 --> 00:22:22,27 the end there were stories for Thanksgiving my mother's daughter 235 00:22:22,28 --> 00:22:27,94 a tomboy no need for dresses or jewelry never a dollar or 236 00:22:27,95 --> 00:22:34,68 a dance lesson mom's lipstick and my football her parties and my books 237 00:22:35,84 --> 00:22:42,69 I wish I could have shown her who I have become finally with out 238 00:22:42,70 --> 00:22:49,50 her. Now though my daughter might call from Africa where she might 239 00:22:49,51 --> 00:22:56,44 not I sit and worry and wisdom and somehow they become judgment and control my 240 00:22:56,45 --> 00:23:02,88 telephone calls hit walls if they landed all she not certain cuts I can't tell 241 00:23:02,89 --> 00:23:09,75 which who would trade all the horses and holding hands 242 00:23:10,35 --> 00:23:16,68 for travel and gray hair maybe there will be stories for 243 00:23:16,69 --> 00:23:20,43 Thanksgiving her Africa my dad. 244 00:23:23,44 --> 00:23:30,02 Or maybe you will talk of footballs or shoes books Pardi. 245 00:23:31,74 --> 00:23:38,17 Maybe she will say grandma's burlap was bombs brocade or 246 00:23:38,18 --> 00:23:44,84 a mother's Band-Aid is your daughter's wound or maybe my pearls are her 247 00:23:44,90 --> 00:23:51,14 gold Corning's I wish I could show my God or who I will 248 00:23:51,15 --> 00:23:57,52 become somehow without her though for us now 249 00:23:58,29 --> 00:24:01,19 I'm still holding the phone and waiting. 250 00:24:11,99 --> 00:24:18,78 It has been the best name I was born 251 00:24:18,79 --> 00:24:21,06 confused raised on 252 00:24:21,07 --> 00:24:27,84 a heart beat for my brother rhythm of his brains and brown eyes the 253 00:24:27,85 --> 00:24:34,63 love between mother and son but who could have ever put their finger on 254 00:24:34,64 --> 00:24:36,72 my palm or be 255 00:24:36,73 --> 00:24:43,71 a bob poem all tangled up poor mother who loved to be but 256 00:24:43,75 --> 00:24:50,33 could not understand mother who held air gets in sea shells up close 257 00:24:50,71 --> 00:24:57,71 but you walked miles upon miles upon groupings and grains of sand I could 258 00:24:57,72 --> 00:25:04,52 not be picked up where she. I could not be named and the 259 00:25:04,53 --> 00:25:10,100 flowers my brother would bring were yellow and gold and red and 260 00:25:11,01 --> 00:25:17,38 blue my colors were full of water. Entire landscapes 261 00:25:17,39 --> 00:25:23,97 washed moody skies like I'm a teaspoon no longer a woman no longer 262 00:25:23,98 --> 00:25:25,03 a beauty only 263 00:25:25,04 --> 00:25:31,96 a blur with no frame and behind my eyes now I am full 264 00:25:32,00 --> 00:25:39,00 of water for my daughter who leaves me as if she knew how I am full of 265 00:25:39,01 --> 00:25:41,64 need for her to be there like 266 00:25:41,65 --> 00:25:48,37 a mother fer me who is afraid of the empty bucket that is my soul running scared to 267 00:25:48,38 --> 00:25:54,98 be alone scared of not being enough looking for art inside intimacy is if 268 00:25:55,21 --> 00:26:02,14 poems were shared things as if breath was more than solitary has if the flow 269 00:26:02,15 --> 00:26:03,37 of was not 270 00:26:03,73 --> 00:26:10,25 a close shade and even now I see in an out of 271 00:26:10,26 --> 00:26:17,26 cracks where I reside like glue claiming all the things that have touched 272 00:26:17,27 --> 00:26:24,03 me belong here to day so that I might see myself 273 00:26:24,86 --> 00:26:26,78 so that I might give myself 274 00:26:26,79 --> 00:26:33,48 a name like mother it has been the best. The 275 00:26:33,52 --> 00:26:40,41 clearest and I get the perfect Snapdragon the ultimate landscape and all the grains 276 00:26:40,42 --> 00:26:41,77 of sand on the earth 277 00:26:42,53 --> 00:26:56,97 a name like mother to you my beautiful daughter. This 278 00:26:56,98 --> 00:27:03,59 is my last piece about my mother and when my mother passed away 279 00:27:04,48 --> 00:27:09,95 we had no memorial service for her or her request it was really 280 00:27:09,96 --> 00:27:15,23 a deal I think but about two years later my 281 00:27:15,27 --> 00:27:21,57 a friend of hers died my step father asked me to come with him to that memorial 282 00:27:21,58 --> 00:27:27,23 service and I did and when I got there the entire 283 00:27:28,16 --> 00:27:33,88 service everybody there wanted to talk to me about my mother they wanted to chance 284 00:27:33,89 --> 00:27:39,40 to tell me how much they loved her and I sat down and wrote this after I got home 285 00:27:39,41 --> 00:27:46,41 from that memorial service. And just as if my 286 00:27:46,42 --> 00:27:52,70 mother spoke to me out of every mouth in the House about her part that drew people 287 00:27:52,71 --> 00:27:59,03 aside drew laughter she would paint the extra shape for them or crack the mosaic 288 00:27:59,04 --> 00:28:00,91 and meet new lines running like 289 00:28:00,92 --> 00:28:06,29 a party joke while she pushed clay around on the table they said and it came out 290 00:28:06,33 --> 00:28:08,96 roses the arrangement made by 291 00:28:08,97 --> 00:28:15,90 a traveling girl working her poems into us like coconut oil we felt warm they 292 00:28:15,91 --> 00:28:22,53 said and brow when she was done well then I remember the eight 293 00:28:22,54 --> 00:28:23,99 millimeter clacking out 294 00:28:23,100 --> 00:28:30,92 a shaft of light dust in the living room rising up into it mom on the screen in 295 00:28:30,97 --> 00:28:36,38 pink and orange waving to us like some Christmas tree with white strung in all 296 00:28:36,39 --> 00:28:38,28 colors ornaments in 297 00:28:38,29 --> 00:28:44,92 a box on the floor like chocolates waiting. My heart burst then for 298 00:28:44,93 --> 00:28:47,27 want of her breast again and 299 00:28:47,28 --> 00:28:53,58 a fairy tale. To have the love of that woman in three 300 00:28:53,59 --> 00:28:55,01 poems maybe with 301 00:28:55,02 --> 00:29:01,83 a sparkle of starkers. Up to her hips in safely I remember my nose 302 00:29:01,84 --> 00:29:07,77 peeking over the car she turned to the cereal boxes I could drive straight into her 303 00:29:07,78 --> 00:29:09,78 ankles breaks no more than 304 00:29:09,79 --> 00:29:16,49 a metaphor and the sugar behind her red lips kissed my forehead afterwards 305 00:29:16,80 --> 00:29:23,80 and arms that were full of bread held my questions back from the answers 306 00:29:24,10 --> 00:29:30,96 answers she swore with my heart my feet in her 307 00:29:30,97 --> 00:29:37,84 shoes played with royalty out of every mouth in the house 308 00:29:37,85 --> 00:29:41,02 that day my glittered memory like 309 00:29:41,03 --> 00:29:46,52 a picture book under the quilt and just as if the light were on again in the 310 00:29:46,53 --> 00:29:51,45 hallway I can hear my mother again and she is saying. 311 00:30:01,40 --> 00:30:08,39 Thank you. And next up we 312 00:30:08,40 --> 00:30:11,29 have David to hope for and David has published 313 00:30:11,30 --> 00:30:17,45 a number of stories and poems including two collections of poetry the bridge which 314 00:30:17,46 --> 00:30:22,80 is due out in April and sixty four questions his poems have appeared in numerous 315 00:30:22,81 --> 00:30:28,07 literary journals and in thought and he has recently won several poetry 316 00:30:28,08 --> 00:30:33,58 competitions in spite of his contention that he never wins anything he teaches 317 00:30:33,59 --> 00:30:39,82 English at College of the redwoods any lives in Eureka California oakum David Cole 318 00:30:39,83 --> 00:30:40,17 for. 319 00:30:51,26 --> 00:30:54,89 Right so this first poem is about 320 00:30:54,90 --> 00:31:00,21 a friend of mine her name's Ana we went to high school together and she's just 321 00:31:00,22 --> 00:31:05,42 a dear friend and right out of high school the day she left high school she went 322 00:31:05,43 --> 00:31:10,34 travelling to India and she traveled all over the place and eventually she came 323 00:31:10,35 --> 00:31:14,38 back to marine County where we both grew up and she settled in 324 00:31:14,39 --> 00:31:19,56 a place called slide ranch and I went out to visit her one Sunday and she and 325 00:31:19,57 --> 00:31:20,81 another woman were going to take 326 00:31:20,82 --> 00:31:26,98 a bunch of kids because it was an outdoor school up to this meadow near slide ranch 327 00:31:27,02 --> 00:31:30,89 and they were going to do a little liturgy little church service and I was in 328 00:31:30,90 --> 00:31:33,76 a believer and so the poem is 329 00:31:33,77 --> 00:31:39,39 a little bit about that liturgy and it's also about my inability to pay attention 330 00:31:39,40 --> 00:31:41,96 when I'm in something like that whether it's 331 00:31:41,97 --> 00:31:47,88 a classroom or something of that nature so here it is liturgy at Slide ranch on the 332 00:31:47,89 --> 00:31:54,13 spring Sunday we climbed the grassy hill side overlooking the school gathering 333 00:31:54,14 --> 00:32:00,33 Lupin Queen Anne's lace poppies and mustard we set them as offering in 334 00:32:00,34 --> 00:32:06,25 a green glass jar on a slab of basalt before us the children sang 335 00:32:06,26 --> 00:32:08,51 a few from ill your songs and then 336 00:32:08,52 --> 00:32:15,47 a woman intoned about creation I tried my best to listen but the morning 337 00:32:15,48 --> 00:32:22,05 to structed me the bees swept through the spring grass hunting blossoms the earth 338 00:32:22,06 --> 00:32:28,61 smelled wild and rich above a red tail hawk rode a thermal tilting to 339 00:32:28,62 --> 00:32:35,45 a rocky outcropping. Her alert. In the distance the sea found 340 00:32:35,46 --> 00:32:41,14 its voice waves thudding against the stacks and my eyes followed to the song 341 00:32:41,71 --> 00:32:48,34 everywhere I looked wonder called in her sweet voice and my breath held with the 342 00:32:48,35 --> 00:32:49,52 holiness of it all. 343 00:32:57,29 --> 00:32:59,80 So I wrote this poem about 344 00:32:59,81 --> 00:33:05,15 a year or two ago I don't remember exactly but I do remember that. 345 00:33:06,92 --> 00:33:11,91 I had opened up the newspaper and I was reading it and having coffee early in the 346 00:33:11,92 --> 00:33:12,95 morning started 347 00:33:12,96 --> 00:33:19,38 a fire in my house and. Was very quiet my wife wasn't up yet it was just me reading 348 00:33:19,39 --> 00:33:25,78 the paper and it was just one more story about a white police officer shooting 349 00:33:25,79 --> 00:33:32,70 a black man who was unarmed in whatever circumstances that was and just feeling 350 00:33:33,17 --> 00:33:40,07 once again sick to my stomach and I just wanted to and I'd read this story and 351 00:33:40,08 --> 00:33:45,39 seen this video over and over and over again just like you have and so I decided 352 00:33:45,71 --> 00:33:49,14 I'm going to write home about this I don't really written about this subject and 353 00:33:49,15 --> 00:33:55,50 it's really outside of my comfort zone and so this poem came out very quickly 354 00:33:55,95 --> 00:34:02,83 and. And it's called broken broken is the 355 00:34:02,84 --> 00:34:09,71 black body broken its name broken it's fine bones it's 356 00:34:09,72 --> 00:34:16,40 dark glass broken the soul into which we peer blood pooling 357 00:34:16,57 --> 00:34:22,51 unmoving over whom some badge bully looms broken the spirit 358 00:34:22,66 --> 00:34:29,09 incarcerated in masculine ated forgotten broken the family without this 359 00:34:29,59 --> 00:34:35,83 husband father son uncle someone ever absent. Broke in the 360 00:34:35,84 --> 00:34:41,91 neighborhood the Barton shattered windows the gangs the bullet always keening and 361 00:34:41,92 --> 00:34:48,21 hungry broken the words we tell to employ the story mere graffiti 362 00:34:49,00 --> 00:34:55,27 broken the language that cannot help us understand broken the eye that watches 363 00:34:55,65 --> 00:35:01,01 broken the either it spins us what to watch broken the leaders who say what the i 364 00:35:01,94 --> 00:35:08,01 what the I should show what the I should see what all this must mean broken the 365 00:35:08,02 --> 00:35:14,94 machine that says Face it this is the only system everyone must obey broken the 366 00:35:14,95 --> 00:35:21,42 words by which we intone this sorry story broken in turn are we to place the way 367 00:35:21,43 --> 00:35:27,41 for of hatred onto our children's tongue broken the children who choked down this 368 00:35:27,42 --> 00:35:32,03 lie knowing no better than what we insist must be so. 369 00:35:34,64 --> 00:35:41,58 Thank you thank you. So this one 370 00:35:42,26 --> 00:35:48,16 when I was going to humble years ago and I first met Neil Turpie who you're going 371 00:35:48,17 --> 00:35:52,78 to see her in a little bit. It was nine hundred eighty and humble County was in 372 00:35:52,79 --> 00:35:57,40 a bad recession I don't know if any of you remember this but as 373 00:35:57,41 --> 00:35:59,48 a college student I realized I'm not going to get 374 00:35:59,49 --> 00:36:04,29 a job here this summer what am I going to possibly do and two young women in my 375 00:36:04,30 --> 00:36:07,44 French class said well we're going to get on 376 00:36:07,45 --> 00:36:10,71 a bus and go to Seattle and hop on the ferry and go up to Alaska and work in 377 00:36:10,72 --> 00:36:17,31 a cannery do you want to come with us. And I said Sure well you know and so I 378 00:36:17,32 --> 00:36:21,91 hitchhiked up to Seattle I joined them we took deck passage I got off and catch 379 00:36:21,92 --> 00:36:25,04 a can and I got a job that summer driving 380 00:36:25,05 --> 00:36:31,76 a cab in catching and working night shift from seven to seven you know 381 00:36:31,77 --> 00:36:35,78 seven a night to seven every morning and if you drive 382 00:36:35,79 --> 00:36:40,73 a cab in any town and you drive night shift you kind of see the underbelly of 383 00:36:40,79 --> 00:36:47,67 things and you see some weird things go on so. This is the poem 384 00:36:47,71 --> 00:36:53,04 of an experience I had one night driving cow and an interesting aside about this 385 00:36:53,05 --> 00:36:59,56 poem is that. It hasn't been published but about a year ago I submitted it to 386 00:36:59,57 --> 00:37:02,98 a thing called the visible poetry project and when you submit 387 00:37:02,99 --> 00:37:05,86 a poem to this they are there's 388 00:37:05,87 --> 00:37:09,40 a bunch of filmmakers and the filmmakers pick and choose among the poems and the 389 00:37:09,41 --> 00:37:13,93 poets and if they want they like your poem they make a film of it so 390 00:37:13,94 --> 00:37:14,83 a guy emailed me 391 00:37:14,84 --> 00:37:18,24 a guy named Daniel Hugh from New Jersey emailed me and said I'd like to make 392 00:37:18,25 --> 00:37:22,25 a film of a film out of your poem and I didn't know it at the time and he did make 393 00:37:22,26 --> 00:37:24,97 a film of it and it's a good film but he was 394 00:37:24,98 --> 00:37:30,12 a soft worn high school in New Jersey and so he if you look it up you can find this 395 00:37:30,13 --> 00:37:35,91 poem called what they can say of love. That's about this so it's on the visible 396 00:37:35,92 --> 00:37:41,43 poetry projects website anyway here's the story and I swear to god this is what 397 00:37:41,44 --> 00:37:48,09 every writer says it's true I made none of this up. The lessons Oh and oh 398 00:37:48,42 --> 00:37:49,22 I got to back up just 399 00:37:49,23 --> 00:37:52,75 a little bit this is set in catch can and catch cans on an island named or 400 00:37:52,76 --> 00:37:53,17 a village 401 00:37:53,18 --> 00:37:57,79 a ghetto and the island just across the Narrows of water is groovy know where the 402 00:37:58,78 --> 00:38:02,99 the airport is and there's another island slightly farther away called Met look out 403 00:38:03,00 --> 00:38:07,08 line and there are these terms are brought up and there is also clink its who are 404 00:38:07,09 --> 00:38:12,02 Native Americans in the area just so you know what this stuff is. The lessons of 405 00:38:12,03 --> 00:38:15,37 love are tied to our hands if you place 406 00:38:15,38 --> 00:38:21,19 a single finger on the heart you can point to its source even if this source is 407 00:38:21,20 --> 00:38:27,51 slippery I learned this lesson driving cab in catch can the man who taught me this 408 00:38:27,52 --> 00:38:32,50 lesson arrived just before dark one summer evening he came striding up the float 409 00:38:32,51 --> 00:38:38,04 plane docks just as the Sun Bird its red fingers in the narrows between religious 410 00:38:38,05 --> 00:38:43,87 ghetto and groovy I reached out to shake his hand but he only smiled at me and I 411 00:38:43,88 --> 00:38:49,36 noticed he held something close to his chest we both piled in the checker marathon 412 00:38:49,68 --> 00:38:55,95 hospital he said what happened I asked glancing up in the rearview. I was expecting 413 00:38:56,00 --> 00:39:02,90 chainsaw or misery with fire or fishing but it was none of that years before he 414 00:39:02,91 --> 00:39:04,08 said he'd married 415 00:39:04,09 --> 00:39:10,32 a clink at woman he described her the way someone might describe some unexpected 416 00:39:10,33 --> 00:39:16,54 treasure of greatest value her raven black eyes and hair the way she smelled of 417 00:39:16,55 --> 00:39:21,62 pine wildflowers Springwater her breasts as luscious as 418 00:39:21,63 --> 00:39:26,99 a full moon hanging over him at like out loud he even described the mythical bliss 419 00:39:27,00 --> 00:39:28,24 of making love to such 420 00:39:28,25 --> 00:39:34,59 a woman but the hand I asked what happened to your hand he looked shocked 421 00:39:35,54 --> 00:39:41,66 we fight sometimes you see he described how they'd gotten drunk that morning fought 422 00:39:41,70 --> 00:39:48,07 all day and come afternoon she'd had enough so what did she do I asked 423 00:39:49,27 --> 00:39:54,89 he lifted a baggie out of his shirt. Inside there was half 424 00:39:54,90 --> 00:40:01,12 a finger packed in ice she bit it off he said words failed us both. 425 00:40:02,67 --> 00:40:07,93 Later that night I picked him up his hand heavily bandaged somehow I didn't even 426 00:40:07,94 --> 00:40:13,40 need to ask if he still loved her it was written in the way he tenderly cradled his 427 00:40:13,41 --> 00:40:19,47 hand against his chest I imagine that when he got home she would hold his broken 428 00:40:19,48 --> 00:40:24,65 hand to her heart and all either of them would need to hear would be spoken through 429 00:40:24,66 --> 00:40:27,66 the beat of her heart through his fingertips. 430 00:40:29,91 --> 00:40:33,75 Thank you thanks. 431 00:40:36,76 --> 00:40:42,96 Yeah so true story hard to believe but there it is all right so this next one 432 00:40:43,72 --> 00:40:45,79 after I graduated humble I had 433 00:40:45,80 --> 00:40:49,92 a degree in English and didn't seem like you could do much with it I had all this 434 00:40:49,93 --> 00:40:53,24 debt to pay off and I wanted to go to grad school and learn some more about writing 435 00:40:53,50 --> 00:40:57,70 so I wound up joining the military and I was in the military for four years and it 436 00:40:57,71 --> 00:40:58,89 was during the Cold War I was 437 00:40:58,90 --> 00:41:03,70 a Russian linguist and during that period of time I was stationed for 438 00:41:03,71 --> 00:41:10,71 a while. For Devins just outside of Boston and just forty maybe like 439 00:41:10,72 --> 00:41:13,10 twenty minutes from Fort Devons there was 440 00:41:13,11 --> 00:41:16,71 a place to climb and I used to do technical rock climbing and I met 441 00:41:16,72 --> 00:41:21,17 a guy there who was a green grey a guy named John Mickel awful and not 442 00:41:21,18 --> 00:41:26,43 a musician but. And we started climbing with each other that summer and we got 443 00:41:26,52 --> 00:41:28,54 really strong and decided we should go do 444 00:41:28,55 --> 00:41:34,86 a big wall so we went to the same cliff face where the old man in the mountains 445 00:41:34,87 --> 00:41:39,44 used to be it collapsed but it was it was up there when we went to climb this face 446 00:41:39,63 --> 00:41:43,41 anyway the cliff that the section of cliff that we climbed was called Moby Grape 447 00:41:43,42 --> 00:41:44,43 that was the route is about 448 00:41:44,44 --> 00:41:50,76 a thousand feet from the base to the summit and. You know we were climbing well and 449 00:41:50,77 --> 00:41:53,46 everything but you'll see the day kind of when 450 00:41:53,47 --> 00:41:58,82 a rock so this is the story of what happened that day on Moby Grape It's called 451 00:41:58,83 --> 00:42:04,44 subtracting the darkness. I got to pick this one up this one has to be read at 452 00:42:04,45 --> 00:42:11,41 a certain pace. Through Glass through retina and sin apps the in CAN doesn't flash 453 00:42:11,42 --> 00:42:16,88 that stops the second for the longer second in suck of shivering breath and then 454 00:42:16,93 --> 00:42:22,84 boom I cringe and my children rush to the window to see the next bold and my wife 455 00:42:22,85 --> 00:42:28,00 is arising from the dinner table to join them and in the nervous shock of the 456 00:42:28,01 --> 00:42:32,67 thunder I am suddenly swept back two decades into the current of climbing Moby 457 00:42:32,68 --> 00:42:39,05 Grape in the canon mountains of New Hampshire the wind just freshening so I cannot 458 00:42:39,06 --> 00:42:41,37 hear what my partner John is yelling from 459 00:42:41,38 --> 00:42:47,34 a hundred feet below and I notice the cars in the parking lot below are all fleeing 460 00:42:47,73 --> 00:42:53,31 and there is only my solo white pickup truck and John still edgy edgy all day 461 00:42:53,32 --> 00:42:59,40 really from falling on the first pitch and I'm edgy too in his ego concentric drama 462 00:42:59,41 --> 00:43:04,92 wanting to shove it roughly aside and say Get focused where nearly six hundred feet 463 00:43:04,93 --> 00:43:10,81 up sheer granite and the mist begins to erase any certainty and John comes up to 464 00:43:10,82 --> 00:43:15,09 finish his pitch and we're both staring at the Guidebook but neither of us is 465 00:43:15,10 --> 00:43:20,99 certain of we're on route or off route and the mist is turning to rain and we 466 00:43:21,00 --> 00:43:27,13 gradually climb into darkness and I'm leading what I'm hoping is the last pitch and 467 00:43:27,14 --> 00:43:28,73 I fumble a wedge into 468 00:43:28,74 --> 00:43:35,60 a long crack with wet trembling fingers and it slips and falls and the Caribbean 469 00:43:35,61 --> 00:43:40,25 or and the wedge clank clank clank ing their way down the slick granite until they 470 00:43:40,26 --> 00:43:46,53 knock free both pieces below mean. So there is no protection for sixty feet of 471 00:43:46,54 --> 00:43:51,79 sickening space between me and John and if I fall this far above 472 00:43:51,80 --> 00:43:57,47 a mall terrace both off the cliff and just then the first bolt of lightning lets 473 00:43:57,48 --> 00:43:58,21 loose and 474 00:43:58,22 --> 00:44:03,09 a second later the thunder more deafening than anything I've ever heard and I'm 475 00:44:03,10 --> 00:44:07,51 waiting for the implosion of electricity to come riverine down the crack where I'm 476 00:44:07,52 --> 00:44:14,13 hanging but it doesn't it doesn't and I realize I am holding my breath 477 00:44:14,49 --> 00:44:19,27 and I shakily jamming the last piece and in another ten feet I'm tying off at the 478 00:44:19,28 --> 00:44:24,33 top and I want to meall down and kissed the rock I'm so stunned so happy and the 479 00:44:24,34 --> 00:44:26,31 lightning flashes again less than 480 00:44:26,32 --> 00:44:32,55 a hundred feet away I feel it vibrate through the rock this time the ozone torches 481 00:44:32,63 --> 00:44:38,24 every smell and John tops the wall and we're running around the summit in the crazy 482 00:44:38,25 --> 00:44:43,17 darkness punctuated by bursts of lightning hunting for the trail the guidebook 483 00:44:43,18 --> 00:44:47,95 tossed back and forth between us for twenty minutes this insane dance inviting our 484 00:44:47,96 --> 00:44:53,82 destruction and finally finally we find the trail and we are leaping down between 485 00:44:53,83 --> 00:44:59,89 the brush to safety and I swear I will never never never climb again and the 486 00:44:59,90 --> 00:45:06,05 lightning flashes again as my family stands at the window and I realize I'm still 487 00:45:06,06 --> 00:45:12,40 holding my breath. And I rise and I go stand at the window while we all watch the 488 00:45:12,41 --> 00:45:19,25 Long find branches of in can destine subtract the darkness one long can and been at 489 00:45:19,26 --> 00:45:19,76 a time. 490 00:45:21,31 --> 00:45:28,27 Thank you and you'll be 491 00:45:28,35 --> 00:45:29,84 happy to know I never did 492 00:45:29,85 --> 00:45:35,77 a big wall after that that was it was anough about OK and I'm going to do one last 493 00:45:35,78 --> 00:45:42,74 poem and just as context for this when I got out of the Army I was lookin to do 494 00:45:42,75 --> 00:45:47,31 something I drove a cab briefly here in Eureka and then I was going to get 495 00:45:47,32 --> 00:45:51,24 a job and somebody at the Employment Development Department told me there was 496 00:45:51,25 --> 00:45:56,30 a job available working in Redwood National Park that summer running the why A.C.C. 497 00:45:56,31 --> 00:46:03,01 Is the director and so I directed to the cruise I too had to couple 498 00:46:03,02 --> 00:46:07,85 adult leaders and the last project of the summer and was wonderful was we were 499 00:46:07,86 --> 00:46:12,62 directed to finish the last section of the skunk cabbage trail so if you've ever 500 00:46:12,63 --> 00:46:19,15 hiked it we did the section you go out the valley up to kind of to 501 00:46:19,57 --> 00:46:23,04 the place where you can overlook the ocean for the first time and then you double 502 00:46:23,05 --> 00:46:23,88 back and there's kind of 503 00:46:23,89 --> 00:46:28,06 a ramp that you go we did the section from the ramp all the way to the beach so. 504 00:46:29,67 --> 00:46:32,11 And my wife and I have gone back to that trailer hiked it 505 00:46:32,12 --> 00:46:35,87 a number of times she wasn't involved in building it or anything but it's kind of 506 00:46:35,88 --> 00:46:39,13 like a sentimental thing we do every once in a while so I don't know 507 00:46:39,14 --> 00:46:43,04 a few years back we were driving through Redwood National Park and she said Oh 508 00:46:43,11 --> 00:46:47,17 let's stop and I trail and I says Come late the day she goes doesn't matter let's 509 00:46:47,18 --> 00:46:50,72 go anyway it would be fun so we wound up hiking and it's 510 00:46:50,73 --> 00:46:56,45 a truck out to the beach and back I don't know it's probably twelve miles or so out 511 00:46:56,46 --> 00:47:03,19 back so this is the day that we went hike the skunk cabbage trail we go as 512 00:47:03,20 --> 00:47:09,15 gift to one another on our anniversary. We last hike this way nearly twenty years 513 00:47:09,16 --> 00:47:12,14 before now a little older 514 00:47:12,44 --> 00:47:17,40 a little slower we start late with no mind to the eight mile trip that lies before 515 00:47:17,41 --> 00:47:23,44 us we eagerly wend our way up the valley July is almost over and the chrome yellow 516 00:47:23,45 --> 00:47:29,82 flowers of the skunk cabbage are passed the light is green as memory under the 517 00:47:29,83 --> 00:47:36,00 Giants it because spruce talking of building the trail talking of our life together 518 00:47:36,78 --> 00:47:43,09 evidence of logging is everywhere now read our older has filled in the gaps left by 519 00:47:43,10 --> 00:47:48,45 the fallen redwoods and then the climb begins first the switchbacks up the valley 520 00:47:48,46 --> 00:47:53,56 wall and later the land for the ramp that leads over the ridge delivering us after 521 00:47:53,57 --> 00:48:00,06 a long stretch on cold bluff speech there you take off your shoes your socks your 522 00:48:00,07 --> 00:48:06,41 pants and wade out into the waters this far as the eye can see there is no one to 523 00:48:06,42 --> 00:48:13,42 watch this baptism nor any need for any I except mine for this my love is the gift 524 00:48:14,05 --> 00:48:20,64 of what time in all its lows certain to slow certitude has no sway thank you 525 00:48:21,34 --> 00:48:27,55 thank you. 526 00:48:29,34 --> 00:48:34,83 So the next writer is Doc still a good friend Doc still is 527 00:48:34,84 --> 00:48:38,57 a retired professor from Humboldt State University he's 528 00:48:38,58 --> 00:48:45,04 a radio host literature sports and jazz afficionado and writer and poet. He was an 529 00:48:45,05 --> 00:48:50,61 interviewer a reviewer for The New Books network for new books in jazz he hosted 530 00:48:50,65 --> 00:48:55,58 a Classics literature radio show for twenty years and he wrote and narrated seventy 531 00:48:55,59 --> 00:48:58,66 five sports history pieces for E.S.P.N. 532 00:48:59,01 --> 00:49:05,05 Radio sports and now he says it's all about travel and romance so doc's that. 533 00:49:15,20 --> 00:49:21,70 I hold on. You know I've got a forty second poem for you have and then 534 00:49:21,71 --> 00:49:28,23 a story called The Cuban diaries. This is called sport is rhythm 535 00:49:31,05 --> 00:49:35,02 it's a backhand stab a worm burner grounder behind third base followed by 536 00:49:35,03 --> 00:49:40,49 a get to your feet frozen rope throw to first to nail a runner it's 537 00:49:40,50 --> 00:49:44,10 a pump fake get him in the air turn around jump or from the baseline it's 538 00:49:44,11 --> 00:49:51,07 a left hook body shot off your back leg that stops the heavy bag no vibration 539 00:49:51,55 --> 00:49:58,53 on the chain sport is rhythm it's playing with movement melodies 540 00:49:58,54 --> 00:50:05,24 over your heart beat it stepping inside your opponent's sense of time it's 541 00:50:05,25 --> 00:50:11,11 playing with space in the paradox of pace it's Will 542 00:50:11,73 --> 00:50:18,29 strategy innovation kinetic Corps it's it's your own 543 00:50:18,30 --> 00:50:23,99 song your own sente and sensuous 544 00:50:24,79 --> 00:50:25,60 symphony. 545 00:50:34,29 --> 00:50:39,79 So I recently went to Cuba. And this is. 546 00:50:41,43 --> 00:50:47,27 An excerpt of my experiences and the antecedents to my trip 547 00:50:51,87 --> 00:50:54,43 short one. I was spending 548 00:50:54,44 --> 00:51:00,28 a weekend with my parents and Carmel by the sea in October of nineteen sixty two it 549 00:51:00,29 --> 00:51:03,83 was the year Willie Mays and Willie McCovey led the San Francisco Giants to within 550 00:51:03,84 --> 00:51:06,73 one out of defeating the New York Yankees in the World Series 551 00:51:07,25 --> 00:51:12,45 a heartbreaker even to the one nine hundred sixty two was the first year I ever 552 00:51:12,46 --> 00:51:19,14 collected baseball cards and my best buddy the smartest kid I ever met and I made 553 00:51:19,15 --> 00:51:24,59 Berkeley Hills crank Mont primary school history with an epic mantle for May's 554 00:51:24,60 --> 00:51:29,69 baseball card trade in the middle of the schoolyard surrounded by the entire 555 00:51:29,70 --> 00:51:36,46 student body staff and teachers Cuba had great baseball stars in one thousand nine 556 00:51:36,47 --> 00:51:41,34 hundred sixty two unforgettable names like to meal Pasquali Tony Oliva was only 557 00:51:41,35 --> 00:51:48,18 oversized cookie Rojas and my favorite mini minnows I knew 558 00:51:48,19 --> 00:51:53,56 about Cuba because of baseball but on the evening of October two thousand and two 559 00:51:53,57 --> 00:51:58,58 was my family Sept by the fire regular television programming was interrupted and 560 00:51:58,59 --> 00:52:02,86 President John Kennedy addressed the nation and revealed that the Soviet Union had 561 00:52:02,87 --> 00:52:07,48 placed office of missiles with nuclear warheads in Cuba that could hit the United 562 00:52:07,49 --> 00:52:12,56 States in a matter of minutes the bearded besides of Cuba's president 563 00:52:12,57 --> 00:52:17,71 a Fidel Castro who led an improbable communist revolution in one nine hundred fifty 564 00:52:17,72 --> 00:52:19,07 nine I became 565 00:52:19,08 --> 00:52:23,66 a fixture on the Daily News says and for thirteen days the world was on the verge 566 00:52:23,67 --> 00:52:28,69 of nuclear war we were now shown how to duck under our desks if we saw 567 00:52:28,81 --> 00:52:30,82 a bright flash of 568 00:52:30,83 --> 00:52:36,88 a nuclear warhead exploding over the Golden Gate Bridge which we could see from our 569 00:52:36,89 --> 00:52:43,34 little primary school in the Berkeley hills and I remember my little buddy Phil 570 00:52:43,38 --> 00:52:48,79 trying to console me I think Castro likes baseball. 571 00:52:52,52 --> 00:52:53,75 Rocked by the reality of 572 00:52:53,76 --> 00:52:58,27 a barely averted nuclear confrontation and in response to the Cuban Missile Crisis 573 00:52:58,93 --> 00:53:01,95 American folk singer Pete Seeger wrote 574 00:53:01,96 --> 00:53:07,02 a song he based upon the stanzas in the vet or so since IOS by nineteenth century 575 00:53:07,03 --> 00:53:12,30 Cuban poet and revolutionary Jose Marti Seeger wanted to craft 576 00:53:12,31 --> 00:53:14,31 a peace anthem to bring people together in 577 00:53:14,32 --> 00:53:19,01 a by lingual spirit and in the famous Carnegie Hall reunion of the folk singing 578 00:53:19,02 --> 00:53:24,32 group the Weavers Seeger debuted the song one time America in one thousand nine 579 00:53:24,33 --> 00:53:27,41 hundred sixty three about a beautiful young Cuban girl in Guantanamo 580 00:53:28,43 --> 00:53:33,00 a month later at the Berkeley Folk Festival my mother took me to 581 00:53:33,01 --> 00:53:35,57 a children's concert in Berkeley where 582 00:53:35,58 --> 00:53:40,73 a throng of grade school kids listen to Pete Seeger's west coast debut of 583 00:53:40,74 --> 00:53:46,51 Guantanamera one ton America was the first song most of us ever learned to sing in 584 00:53:46,52 --> 00:53:52,25 Spanish Seeger's lyrics barred from the Cuban poet and revolutionary Marty or some 585 00:53:52,26 --> 00:53:57,17 of the most beautiful stanzas in all of Latin American poetry I am 586 00:53:57,18 --> 00:54:02,57 a truthful man from the land of the pause before dying I want to share these poems 587 00:54:02,58 --> 00:54:09,54 of my soul my verses are light green but they are also flaming red my verses are 588 00:54:09,55 --> 00:54:09,85 like 589 00:54:09,86 --> 00:54:16,03 a wounded Fawn seeking refuge in the mountains with the poor people of this earth I 590 00:54:16,04 --> 00:54:22,35 want to share my lot with the poor people of this earth I want to share my life the 591 00:54:22,36 --> 00:54:26,83 little streams of the mountains please me more than the sea 592 00:54:29,13 --> 00:54:35,75 fifty five years after those early Cuban music poetry and sports memories I was 593 00:54:35,76 --> 00:54:37,51 bound for have Anna with 594 00:54:37,52 --> 00:54:42,37 a buddy of mine living in living in Florida who had never been to Cuba and had only 595 00:54:42,38 --> 00:54:48,11 suggested it in jest but I was serious I've been waiting to go for a half 596 00:54:48,12 --> 00:54:53,19 a century. After landing in Havana we stood in the nonmoving customs line at the 597 00:54:53,20 --> 00:54:57,42 airport and an enormous star Cuban who looked like the famous Cuban heavyweight 598 00:54:57,43 --> 00:55:03,99 boxing champion Teofilo Stevenson sensed our impatience well come to Cuba he boomed 599 00:55:04,00 --> 00:55:08,32 out finally after more than an hour and a half to get processed we hired 600 00:55:08,33 --> 00:55:10,90 a cab just outside the airport and in 601 00:55:10,91 --> 00:55:15,45 a startling reality moment we realized we were driving down the street in 602 00:55:15,46 --> 00:55:20,29 a scene we watched in movies documentaries and television for a half a century 603 00:55:20,64 --> 00:55:25,52 a living time more as nine hundred fifty zero American cars appeared in front of us 604 00:55:25,53 --> 00:55:30,89 behind us and coming toward us and we passed eerie signs in Spanish protesting El 605 00:55:30,90 --> 00:55:31,84 bloc A.O. 606 00:55:31,92 --> 00:55:36,78 One of America's longest running trade embargoes in history we hurtled into the 607 00:55:36,79 --> 00:55:41,64 fascinating living breathing architectural museum that was Havana with its spacious 608 00:55:41,65 --> 00:55:44,15 parks Oh poor souls wrought iron railings 609 00:55:44,42 --> 00:55:49,47 a majestic colonial city at once decaying and yet brimming with life with its 610 00:55:49,48 --> 00:55:56,30 resourceful and passionate human populous soon we cruise down the famous Mela cone 611 00:55:56,59 --> 00:56:00,67 the eight kilometer Esplanade with its famous Salt sprayed sea wall along the 612 00:56:00,68 --> 00:56:06,21 Havana Harbor and our driver pointed out the famous mob run pre-revolution hotels 613 00:56:06,49 --> 00:56:11,29 including the hotel Nasional with the rich and famous stayed before and after the 614 00:56:11,30 --> 00:56:17,40 revolution our casa particular area where we roomed in the home of the older Cuban 615 00:56:17,41 --> 00:56:22,23 couple was four blocks from the Malakoff that evening after 616 00:56:22,24 --> 00:56:26,11 a long walk down the Malik Cohen will remain with Cubans playing the guitar and 617 00:56:26,12 --> 00:56:31,01 singing for tourists and lovers young and old watching the sunset we discovered 618 00:56:31,02 --> 00:56:37,98 a quirky jazz club called Lot the wedding hall got the one eyed cat. We walked 619 00:56:37,99 --> 00:56:42,71 in about nine thirty in the evening and they were barely sat on the doorman seemed 620 00:56:42,72 --> 00:56:46,84 a little perturbed that we were there so early and there were no other customers in 621 00:56:46,85 --> 00:56:49,65 there. It was an older heavy set woman and looked like 622 00:56:49,66 --> 00:56:54,69 a comfortable move sitting in the back she was drinking rum and talking with some 623 00:56:54,70 --> 00:56:58,50 of the kitchen help but there was no one else in the bar but after 624 00:56:58,51 --> 00:57:04,34 a while people started to file in and within the hour the buzz of international 625 00:57:04,35 --> 00:57:05,70 languages German Portuguese 626 00:57:05,71 --> 00:57:11,66 a tie and Russian Eastern European Slavic French the band started warming up with 627 00:57:11,67 --> 00:57:15,74 some pulsing romantic music and an old gentleman who was the master of ceremonies 628 00:57:16,24 --> 00:57:19,78 began to tell stories to the audience after 629 00:57:19,79 --> 00:57:24,43 a long winded and welcome an interjection to the singer for the evening we expected 630 00:57:24,44 --> 00:57:30,54 a slinky young female songstress but it was the heavy set woman who'd been sitting 631 00:57:30,55 --> 00:57:35,60 in the back as we'd first arrived she strode like 632 00:57:35,61 --> 00:57:41,91 a warrior to the stage took the microphone and began to same and you would have 633 00:57:41,92 --> 00:57:48,67 thought you were listening to an opera aria by Maria Callas with grandiose but 634 00:57:48,76 --> 00:57:54,83 practiced movements and utter presence she transformed the room 635 00:57:55,73 --> 00:58:02,54 every vowel every consonant every gesture dripped with unashamed 636 00:58:03,04 --> 00:58:08,42 and irrepressible passion at the end of her performance accompanied by thunderous 637 00:58:08,43 --> 00:58:14,51 applause she strode back took her seat in the back of the room sat down with 638 00:58:14,52 --> 00:58:21,23 a cigarette and gazed out upon the audience the heat she had just cast it Cuban 639 00:58:21,24 --> 00:58:25,67 spell upon and that was just the start. 640 00:58:33,20 --> 00:58:36,15 Back in one nine hundred seventy two Playboy magazine published 641 00:58:36,16 --> 00:58:40,69 a story by famed American science fiction writer Ray Bradbury. It was 642 00:58:40,70 --> 00:58:44,13 a fantastical tale called The parrot who met Papa about 643 00:58:44,14 --> 00:58:48,40 a kidnapping of Ernest Hemingway's loquacious parrot from his perch in 644 00:58:48,41 --> 00:58:53,74 a famous bar in Havana who had memorized Hemingway's last unpublished man's. 645 00:58:55,97 --> 00:58:59,63 Book publishers publishers all over the world were trying to get their hands on the 646 00:58:59,64 --> 00:59:04,11 bird and the kidnapper was trying to smuggle the thing out of Cuba to get 647 00:59:04,12 --> 00:59:08,66 a sizable ransom before Castro declared the bird a national monument and 648 00:59:08,67 --> 00:59:14,87 a work of art. The kidnapper decided to paint the parrot black and teach him how to 649 00:59:14,88 --> 00:59:20,81 say never more. But the Hemingway Cuba connection always intrigued. 650 00:59:21,90 --> 00:59:24,61 Hemingway lived in Cuba for twenty years from one thousand nine hundred eighty one 651 00:59:24,62 --> 00:59:29,99 nine hundred sixty he loved Cuba and is still reviewer there by the Cubans his farm 652 00:59:30,00 --> 00:59:34,06 lookout outside Havana where he wrote the Old Man of the sea is one of the most 653 00:59:34,07 --> 00:59:34,45 frequent 654 00:59:34,46 --> 00:59:40,29 a tourist spots in all of Cuba his famous fishing boat is interred there the one 655 00:59:40,30 --> 00:59:45,76 where you could see him patrolling for Nazi U.-Boats before the U.S. 656 00:59:45,77 --> 00:59:49,75 Officially ended the war and you could view his swimming pool where iconic actress 657 00:59:49,76 --> 00:59:54,09 Eva Gardner frolic in the news and where you could look out upon her Vanna and the 658 00:59:54,10 --> 00:59:58,60 harbor in the distance from the rear of the house. Later after returning to have 659 00:59:58,61 --> 01:00:00,28 Vanna we walked into 660 01:00:00,29 --> 01:00:04,68 a near riot of activity at Hemingway's favorite hangout the floor of the two hotel 661 01:00:05,29 --> 01:00:09,90 we could barely move past the shrink wrap all woman Cuban band and what seem like 662 01:00:09,91 --> 01:00:15,12 two hundred or loud revelers inside to our right as we entered was the world's 663 01:00:15,13 --> 01:00:19,88 largest daiquiri fountain to our left in the corner of the bar was 664 01:00:19,89 --> 01:00:25,17 a bronze statue of Hemingway rooting over the activity on the stool where he 665 01:00:25,18 --> 01:00:31,56 reportedly drank one thousand daiquiris and ones that. Fidel Castro and Ernest 666 01:00:31,57 --> 01:00:36,71 Hemingway did meet Castro told the American writer that he read Hemingway's The Sun 667 01:00:36,72 --> 01:00:41,11 Also Rises while he was in prison and he learned some of his revolutionary battle 668 01:00:41,12 --> 01:00:47,28 tactics from Hemingway's novel chronicling the Spanish Civil War Castro in 669 01:00:47,29 --> 01:00:51,68 a small band of revolutionary stage their improbable revolution subsequently 670 01:00:52,20 --> 01:00:58,26 thirteen years later in one nine hundred fifty nine after our Hemingway exploits my 671 01:00:58,27 --> 01:01:01,53 buddy and I wandered through the back streets of Old Havana late in the evening 672 01:01:01,98 --> 01:01:07,38 dropping in on small cafes all of which seemed to have first rate musicians often 673 01:01:07,42 --> 01:01:12,19 outnumbering the patrons we eventually became lost and tried to track back in the 674 01:01:12,20 --> 01:01:14,99 general direction of the central plaza when 675 01:01:14,100 --> 01:01:20,63 a couple of guys in the middle of the street back and us to come upstairs Musica 676 01:01:20,82 --> 01:01:27,55 we're all see the answer and we were escorted up a narrow stairwell into 677 01:01:27,56 --> 01:01:29,72 a small windowless room with 678 01:01:29,73 --> 01:01:36,72 a tiny bar with about four or five empty tables there was nobody in the bar only 679 01:01:36,73 --> 01:01:41,57 a slender elegant young woman who motion for us to come up in order drinks not 680 01:01:41,61 --> 01:01:46,72 quite comprehending our situation we ordered drinks and sat down by ourselves in 681 01:01:46,73 --> 01:01:53,07 silence even the woman behind the bar disappeared when we were astonished when out 682 01:01:53,08 --> 01:01:57,04 of nowhere five use issues came through the back door with our instruments no warm 683 01:01:57,05 --> 01:02:00,96 up or tune up they just started playing the lead singer was 684 01:02:00,97 --> 01:02:03,16 a Cuban Tina Turner lookalike and there was 685 01:02:03,17 --> 01:02:07,09 a well muscle Cuban who after the first couple of songs began singing louder and 686 01:02:07,10 --> 01:02:08,63 louder as if he was in 687 01:02:08,64 --> 01:02:13,97 a trance chanting and sweating Afro Cuban Shaiman sounds I've never heard before 688 01:02:14,81 --> 01:02:20,47 and then people seem to appear at the top of the stairs from out of nowhere every 689 01:02:20,48 --> 01:02:22,37 type of person van 690 01:02:22,38 --> 01:02:27,17 a harem of home boys home girls young old gay straight black white never seen 691 01:02:27,18 --> 01:02:31,63 anything like it. The tiny room was crowded the music was pulsing people were 692 01:02:31,64 --> 01:02:38,47 dancing we lost track of time after two three four hours who knew it was late we 693 01:02:38,48 --> 01:02:44,18 had no idea where we were or the time when we trailed downstairs it was at least 694 01:02:44,19 --> 01:02:46,30 three thirty in the morning and 695 01:02:46,31 --> 01:02:51,23 a guy at the base of the stairs goes doxy and my buddy immediately says see and he 696 01:02:51,24 --> 01:02:55,43 climbs in the car so without discussion but 697 01:02:55,44 --> 01:02:59,11 a pinch of paranoia I get into what appears to be 698 01:02:59,12 --> 01:03:05,23 a fifty three Ford where you can see through the floorboards. And then another guy 699 01:03:05,45 --> 01:03:10,45 gets in the front seat and I'm thinking maybe this isn't the best Transportation 700 01:03:10,46 --> 01:03:15,68 about now but they ask where to and I give him the address of our concept 701 01:03:15,69 --> 01:03:17,33 particularly in those negotiate 702 01:03:17,34 --> 01:03:23,91 a price and we take off I have no idea where we are or where we're going and 703 01:03:23,92 --> 01:03:28,56 they're speaking Spanish so fast it sounds like Turkish on steroids and I'm 704 01:03:28,57 --> 01:03:30,12 thinking we might have 705 01:03:30,13 --> 01:03:35,74 a small problem here but my buddy just looking around like he's enjoying the ride I 706 01:03:35,75 --> 01:03:40,11 don't recognize any of the streets and there's less and less light in that part of 707 01:03:40,12 --> 01:03:41,09 a van of a doesn't have 708 01:03:41,10 --> 01:03:48,01 a lot of light anyway and now I'm flashing back to this classic movie 709 01:03:48,02 --> 01:03:53,44 scene in Rebel Without A Cause in one thousand nine hundred fifty five and you know 710 01:03:53,45 --> 01:03:58,37 James Dean man the chicken scene you know where they race their cars towards the 711 01:03:58,38 --> 01:04:03,18 cliffs over the ocean and have to roll out the door at the last minute before the 712 01:04:03,19 --> 01:04:08,14 car plunges into the sea below so before they compete in the deadly game of chicken 713 01:04:08,15 --> 01:04:12,24 James Dean and Buzz walk out to survey the cliffs overlooking the waves crashing 714 01:04:12,25 --> 01:04:17,49 a thousand feet below and Buzz James Dean's rival for Natalie Wood's character goes 715 01:04:18,18 --> 01:04:24,82 that's the edge. That's the end. James Dean is so cool so cool 716 01:04:26,06 --> 01:04:28,77 yeah certainly. He lets up 717 01:04:28,78 --> 01:04:35,15 a cigarette. And Buzz the tough guy unsettled by Deans preternatural who. 718 01:04:36,49 --> 01:04:42,34 You know something but says I'm like you you know that 719 01:04:44,01 --> 01:04:50,63 and then James Dean says and here's the key why don't we do this 720 01:04:51,71 --> 01:04:58,23 and buzz says because you got it to stop. You 721 01:04:58,24 --> 01:05:04,53 know I'd show that clip to my students at home state I tell them that's the secret 722 01:05:04,54 --> 01:05:10,27 to life right there man you have got to do something my students would look at each 723 01:05:10,28 --> 01:05:17,24 other like ducks crazy. It's crazy and these thoughts are 724 01:05:17,25 --> 01:05:23,20 going through my mind as we careened down darker and darker streets in Old Havana 725 01:05:23,34 --> 01:05:25,59 after multitudinous Mohit zero six and 726 01:05:25,60 --> 01:05:30,94 a surreal Shomron show in the strange bar at three thirty in the. 727 01:05:32,92 --> 01:05:33,96 Now I'm thinking I got 728 01:05:33,97 --> 01:05:37,25 a signal my buddy at the next intersection we're going to roll out the door just 729 01:05:37,26 --> 01:05:38,99 like a chicken seen in Rebel Without 730 01:05:38,100 --> 01:05:42,68 a Cause and I'm trying to get his attention and motion to him an American Sign 731 01:05:42,69 --> 01:05:47,39 Language we got to do something grab the door handles roll out the side man run 732 01:05:47,40 --> 01:05:54,10 towards the ocean swim back to Miami like Diana Nyad. All of a sudden we took 733 01:05:54,11 --> 01:05:59,97 a right turn and I recognized the glorious sea sprayed sea walls of Mallock own 734 01:05:59,98 --> 01:06:06,87 bill of the waves pounding up against the sides in the familiar hotel nice you know 735 01:06:07,50 --> 01:06:11,55 somehow we wind up at our Casa Particular and I paid our drivers shook hands all 736 01:06:11,56 --> 01:06:16,58 smiles my buddy utterly clueless to my mental machinations let us know just saw the 737 01:06:16,59 --> 01:06:23,56 way around. We walk up stairs creep through the front door in our Cuban mama Magali 738 01:06:24,01 --> 01:06:28,82 peeks or head out the door like she's been listening force all night. Yes I went to 739 01:06:28,83 --> 01:06:35,63 Lesotho wreckless to teach she says Well see we reply in harmony and we 740 01:06:35,64 --> 01:06:42,38 never felt safer in our lives says. So one 741 01:06:42,39 --> 01:06:47,84 day in a respite from the sweltering heat of Havana we took 742 01:06:47,85 --> 01:06:49,48 a trip to Las Casas 743 01:06:49,52 --> 01:06:53,92 a forest restoration project that an hour outside of Havana that began in one 744 01:06:53,93 --> 01:06:58,78 thousand nine hundred sixty eight was part of Castro's Green Revolution one of 745 01:06:58,79 --> 01:07:00,11 Cuba's most famous artists had 746 01:07:00,12 --> 01:07:06,05 a permanent residence there with an art studio overlooking the lake in his sixty's 747 01:07:06,06 --> 01:07:09,83 Lester capos radiated irrepressible inner gene from 748 01:07:09,84 --> 01:07:14,38 a short but well muscled frame and one of the dominant themes in his paintings with 749 01:07:14,39 --> 01:07:20,39 the spirit of love an international brotherhood and he had one particular sketch of 750 01:07:20,40 --> 01:07:26,59 our own iconic Washington Monument juxtaposed with the monument to Jose Marti the 751 01:07:26,60 --> 01:07:29,02 one that stands in Havana's plaza below but have 752 01:07:29,03 --> 01:07:34,11 a loose. And of course it was Marty's poetic words that were used in Pete Seeger's 753 01:07:34,51 --> 01:07:40,86 famous song one town America so I told Lester about hearing the words of Cuba's 754 01:07:40,87 --> 01:07:46,89 greatest poet fifty five years ago as I sat in that song circle on the floor with 755 01:07:46,90 --> 01:07:52,17 my little friends listening to Pete Seeger in Berkeley in the spring of nineteen 756 01:07:52,18 --> 01:07:57,06 sixty three and Lester put his hand on my shoulder and led me over to 757 01:07:57,07 --> 01:08:03,92 a photograph that hung on the wall it was Lester himself with Pete Seeger at 758 01:08:03,93 --> 01:08:10,93 one of Lester's art showings of all places the World Trade Center in the one 759 01:08:10,94 --> 01:08:12,01 nine hundred ninety S. 760 01:08:13,84 --> 01:08:17,24 And so I thought about those innocent days in one thousand nine hundred sixty two 761 01:08:17,25 --> 01:08:21,52 that first year of collecting baseball cards Maison mantle and those unforgettable 762 01:08:21,53 --> 01:08:26,79 Cuban names like cookie Rojas and many men also. After the Cuban missile crisis how 763 01:08:26,80 --> 01:08:32,34 my best buddy Philip consoled me with the perfect sandlot rejoinder to my newfound 764 01:08:32,35 --> 01:08:39,29 political paranoia when he said I think Castro likes baseball and of course 765 01:08:39,30 --> 01:08:44,91 my will but he Phil was right if he only could have been more right 766 01:08:46,27 --> 01:08:51,05 you see Castro saw sport as instrumental in the health and political symbol of the 767 01:08:51,06 --> 01:08:57,75 strength of Cuba he did like baseball in one thousand fifty one eight years before 768 01:08:57,76 --> 01:09:00,63 the revolution Fidel Castro was 769 01:09:00,64 --> 01:09:06,32 a Havana high school basketball and track star also an excellent baseball player 770 01:09:07,27 --> 01:09:10,90 according to legend Castro apparently deliberately walked on the field or an 771 01:09:10,91 --> 01:09:14,65 informal baseball tryout session held by 772 01:09:14,66 --> 01:09:21,57 a famous Major League scout living in Atlanta and as apocryphal story skill at that 773 01:09:21,58 --> 01:09:24,63 young university pre-law student showed more of a pitch repertoire 774 01:09:24,64 --> 01:09:30,53 a better curveball more control history might have been entirely different maybe I 775 01:09:30,54 --> 01:09:37,22 might have traded mantle for many men also cookie Rojas and for Del Castro on that 776 01:09:37,23 --> 01:09:41,78 Berkeley school yard in one nine hundred sixty two Kennedy never would have made 777 01:09:41,79 --> 01:09:48,17 that speech. So as the plane took off from Havana on my flight back to Tampa 778 01:09:49,52 --> 01:09:55,30 I continued to think about the Diva The one eyed cat revolutionary rhetoric 779 01:09:56,28 --> 01:10:03,15 while rides in Old Havana Hemingway and daiquiris in the painting in the studio by 780 01:10:03,16 --> 01:10:08,40 the lake in the eco reserve of the two minute once the Washington Monument in 781 01:10:08,41 --> 01:10:09,53 Washington D.C. 782 01:10:10,48 --> 01:10:16,61 And the monument of Jose Marti in Atlanta standing shoulder to shoulder and as the 783 01:10:16,62 --> 01:10:23,54 wheels touched down in Tampa. I still had Guantanamera ringing 784 01:10:23,55 --> 01:10:27,84 in my ear. Thank you for 785 01:10:27,85 --> 01:10:31,36 five. 786 01:10:33,87 --> 01:10:39,24 For five. Thank you. 787 01:10:41,38 --> 01:10:46,62 You really put me on the spot you know soiled all my days and said Oh I don't like 788 01:10:46,63 --> 01:10:52,83 places to the bottom in the oven so I didn't plan on that for the show thank you 789 01:10:53,34 --> 01:10:59,50 all right my next. My next author guest for our show tonight is Neil Tarpey 790 01:11:00,12 --> 01:11:02,45 and he's the author of flashes of lightning 791 01:11:02,46 --> 01:11:08,65 a collection of fifty two short short stories Neil hails from New York City he's 792 01:11:08,66 --> 01:11:12,20 lived in humble County for the past forty two years as 793 01:11:12,21 --> 01:11:14,25 a former counselor and sports writer who's working on 794 01:11:14,26 --> 01:11:18,97 a murder mystery set in Northern humble so welcome Neil Harvey 795 01:11:19,73 --> 01:11:24,48 thank you for for. 796 01:11:35,75 --> 01:11:42,75 Those are tough acts to follow. And. I like to thank Matt for 797 01:11:43,22 --> 01:11:48,32 reinforcing what the Catholic nuns taught me the very first week of first grade 798 01:11:49,17 --> 01:11:53,49 eighty's and B.'s and Cs here and you people with the S. And T. 799 01:11:53,50 --> 01:11:58,24 Names down there at the end of the line docs dull you know TARP. 800 01:12:01,77 --> 01:12:08,59 I'm like. Some of my colleagues who write poems or longer stories 801 01:12:09,27 --> 01:12:15,79 I write what are called flash fiction stories now and novels about sixty thousand 802 01:12:15,80 --> 01:12:22,23 words short stories about ten thousand. They say flash fictions about 803 01:12:23,60 --> 01:12:28,45 a thousand what I write is actually called micro fiction which are usually ninety 804 01:12:28,46 --> 01:12:34,85 nine to one hundred one words. So I have to pack in conflict 805 01:12:34,86 --> 01:12:39,73 a few characters and choices pretty quickly to take off running. 806 01:12:42,10 --> 01:12:47,85 The first story I'm going to read. Is actually the first. 807 01:12:49,83 --> 01:12:56,70 Flash fiction story that I ever wrote and I based it upon some of these 808 01:12:56,71 --> 01:12:57,54 probably 809 01:12:58,21 --> 01:13:03,88 a third of the stories are Britain are based on my life and the rest are figments 810 01:13:03,89 --> 01:13:10,47 of my imagination this one reminded me back in the seventy's. The Godfather 811 01:13:10,48 --> 01:13:12,87 was the best picture and there was a lot of talk 812 01:13:12,88 --> 01:13:17,39 a Mafia and who's with the mob and here I am 813 01:13:17,40 --> 01:13:21,84 a kid growing up in New York City and it seems like it's all around me. 814 01:13:24,79 --> 01:13:26,83 For those of you who don't know 815 01:13:26,84 --> 01:13:32,66 a Long Island is it's an island one hundred ten miles long and about twenty five 816 01:13:32,67 --> 01:13:39,41 wide and Brooklyn and Queens are actually at the end one. So two 817 01:13:39,42 --> 01:13:45,05 friends my get married and I said to him I'm in the wedding party more in 818 01:13:45,06 --> 01:13:52,04 a tux I think you know that your carol your girlfriend's family is in the Mafia 819 01:13:52,08 --> 01:13:58,31 please come on now I said you getting the limo for free the flowers for free the 820 01:13:58,32 --> 01:14:02,39 reception hall for free and the band for free what part don't you get. 821 01:14:04,87 --> 01:14:11,86 And something happened at that wedding that. Has stayed with me 822 01:14:12,49 --> 01:14:17,61 my entire life. And so this story is called 823 01:14:18,81 --> 01:14:25,59 handgun wedding. I 824 01:14:25,60 --> 01:14:30,39 noticed that handgun whole student side his great tuxedo. 825 01:14:32,45 --> 01:14:38,43 Beautiful wedding he said handsome couple I said 826 01:14:40,16 --> 01:14:46,89 dark eyes scrutinised me. You the Irish kid to help them move to Long Island 827 01:14:48,28 --> 01:14:53,92 I nodded I'm all cool rock all. Hand shake like 828 01:14:53,93 --> 01:14:56,35 a bear smile like 829 01:14:56,36 --> 01:15:02,47 a fox the bride's felonious but generous uncle Rocco 830 01:15:04,32 --> 01:15:10,75 we always need strong guys for deliveries he puffed on his 831 01:15:10,76 --> 01:15:13,40 cigar he stuffed 832 01:15:13,41 --> 01:15:18,35 a business card in my breast pocket you're now 833 01:15:18,36 --> 01:15:24,86 a friend of the family think about it. I thought about it. 834 01:15:26,36 --> 01:15:27,65 I moved to California. 835 01:15:47,52 --> 01:15:54,04 I don't know how many of you out there go to yard sales garage sales estate 836 01:15:54,05 --> 01:16:01,04 sales if you do he usually does one thing you're looking for whether it's. An old 837 01:16:01,05 --> 01:16:07,84 appliance tools something for your grandkids I go looking for 838 01:16:07,85 --> 01:16:14,03 books and occasionally I have found a note or something tucked into 839 01:16:14,04 --> 01:16:18,68 a book and I would feel like I'm treasuring this book to other people have read 840 01:16:18,69 --> 01:16:25,35 before me now. Those you are not familiar with Ireland. 841 01:16:28,44 --> 01:16:29,84 If Ireland is shaped like 842 01:16:29,85 --> 01:16:36,75 a clock Dublin his like three o'clock always nine o'clock. County Mayo ten 843 01:16:37,01 --> 01:16:42,70 counties like eleven counties like though is where William Butler Yeats the famous 844 01:16:42,70 --> 01:16:49,55 . Irish laureate. Called the land of Heart's Desire because 845 01:16:49,56 --> 01:16:56,53 it's so beautiful. I'm prejudiced because my paternal grandfather 846 01:16:56,54 --> 01:17:02,74 some County Galway and my maternal grandmother some counties I go always wanted to 847 01:17:02,75 --> 01:17:08,92 go to Ireland. So this next story is called yard sale. 848 01:17:18,31 --> 01:17:25,13 Done Levy flipped through boxes of books he discovered nine 849 01:17:25,51 --> 01:17:31,84 hundred dollar bills tucked inside a fifty seven of 850 01:17:31,85 --> 01:17:35,82 a hard covered edition of W B E eight. 851 01:17:38,79 --> 01:17:45,30 Should I tell somebody. Done Levy took the book to the front gate 852 01:17:46,19 --> 01:17:49,15 a young man in a hoodie sat their feet up on 853 01:17:49,16 --> 01:17:55,59 a table smoking that's three dollars but OK give me 854 01:17:55,60 --> 01:18:02,21 a book he farted loudly. Have you read Yeats. Too busy to 855 01:18:02,22 --> 01:18:08,45 read my uncle would supposedly saving money to visit Ireland but that cheapskate 856 01:18:08,46 --> 01:18:14,44 didn't leave me anything just these damn books. Done Levy handed him 857 01:18:14,45 --> 01:18:18,35 a dollar I'll bet County Slagel be beautiful. 858 01:18:30,45 --> 01:18:31,03 I'm afraid I'm 859 01:18:31,04 --> 01:18:39,61 a drop his hand guns are better. Off. Not 860 01:18:39,62 --> 01:18:43,32 loaded. So. 861 01:18:46,92 --> 01:18:50,90 Just as some of the people that preceded me talked about. 862 01:18:54,01 --> 01:18:58,82 Events or incidents in their lives that are so memorable the way they brought them 863 01:18:58,83 --> 01:19:04,96 back this is an event stories based on events that I didn't I know I'll never 864 01:19:04,97 --> 01:19:11,77 forget my entire life and I can still see it like it happened. And it takes 865 01:19:11,78 --> 01:19:17,86 place down in northern Arizona the Navajo reservations Erin 866 01:19:18,25 --> 01:19:24,32 inside the Navajo reservation is the Hopi reservation they live up on tall mesas. 867 01:19:26,40 --> 01:19:32,37 They're famous for civil war and for their Katrina dolls which are these carved 868 01:19:32,79 --> 01:19:37,11 very light Cottonwood dolls so this is 869 01:19:37,12 --> 01:19:41,96 a story have to say kind of wrote itself when I started writing it the word just 870 01:19:41,97 --> 01:19:45,99 kind of came out and it was very little revision to it it almost felt like I was 871 01:19:46,83 --> 01:19:53,54 being directed this is called The Frog clan my 872 01:19:53,55 --> 01:19:59,14 burning headache worse and so I bought water at 873 01:19:59,15 --> 01:20:04,23 a desert market. Will you trade your bracelet. 874 01:20:07,43 --> 01:20:14,27 Asked an Indian woman sitting in the shaded doorway It shows the frog 875 01:20:14,28 --> 01:20:20,84 claimed my mother's the bracelet had circled my wrist 876 01:20:21,45 --> 01:20:28,44 for nine years so I hesitated what will you offer 877 01:20:30,72 --> 01:20:37,58 she handed over her corn maiden Katrina doll I 878 01:20:37,59 --> 01:20:44,45 fingered the cottonwoods likeness considered the painted symbols the mask face 879 01:20:47,12 --> 01:20:53,72 I gave her my praise she slid it on her brown eyes sparkling 880 01:20:56,22 --> 01:21:02,81 that night. While I dreamed of a frog jumping through 881 01:21:02,82 --> 01:21:06,11 a moot cornfield. My fever broke. 882 01:21:18,22 --> 01:21:25,01 I sometimes wonder. About 883 01:21:25,02 --> 01:21:31,03 first dates some of us have had some that were good not so good I wasn't married 884 01:21:31,04 --> 01:21:33,63 until I was thirty six so I had 885 01:21:33,68 --> 01:21:37,90 a lot of opportunities for first dates and when I got together with 886 01:21:37,91 --> 01:21:42,24 a friend of mine and she told me about her first dates I thought yeah this there's 887 01:21:42,25 --> 01:21:46,03 a lot of things said that can go wrong why there's not 888 01:21:46,04 --> 01:21:51,11 a second date. So. This is 889 01:21:51,20 --> 01:21:57,86 a long story this isn't actually two hundred word story. It's called a mother of 890 01:21:57,87 --> 01:22:04,61 a first date. Six months after my divorce 891 01:22:05,75 --> 01:22:12,13 Zelda set me up on a blind date with Henry she said He's 892 01:22:12,14 --> 01:22:18,88 a photographer kind of cute Sunday afternoon I met Henry at 893 01:22:18,89 --> 01:22:25,07 a be struck he offered a limp handshake and said so Ella you paint 894 01:22:25,08 --> 01:22:31,42 a portrait you should paint me what you think. Curly black hair dimples 895 01:22:32,18 --> 01:22:34,56 green eyes Oakley my breasts should I start wearing 896 01:22:34,57 --> 01:22:38,33 a bra. Hold that thought said Henry as 897 01:22:38,34 --> 01:22:43,16 a waiter appeared another double scotch for me and 898 01:22:43,17 --> 01:22:49,86 a glass of house red for the lady. His lady no thanks 899 01:22:50,42 --> 01:22:56,01 I'll have meant tea after the waiter left Henry scout. 900 01:22:57,45 --> 01:23:03,85 Independent women are unpredictable and fear commitment. Wow Has that been your 901 01:23:03,86 --> 01:23:10,72 experience I have. No that's what mother thinks she always knows what's best 902 01:23:10,73 --> 01:23:17,38 for me. Like no second dates. When our drinks arrived Henry 903 01:23:17,39 --> 01:23:24,09 chugged his Scotch mother requests she join us for dinner tonight she'd 904 01:23:24,10 --> 01:23:30,77 love to meet you and then we could all watch Downton Abbey. No I have other plans 905 01:23:31,67 --> 01:23:37,63 parting ways to kill result. Henry licked his lips 906 01:23:38,43 --> 01:23:44,48 leaned in towards me and Mr Hyde emerged. L.-A you're 907 01:23:44,49 --> 01:23:46,12 a hearty How about 908 01:23:46,13 --> 01:23:52,78 a nude photo shoot back in my studio. You better see what Mother thinks 909 01:23:52,79 --> 01:23:54,75 first I said as I stood up and threw 910 01:23:54,76 --> 01:24:11,30 a ten on the table and left. I'm 911 01:24:11,31 --> 01:24:17,22 always interested in the contrast of dark and light and I don't know how many of 912 01:24:17,23 --> 01:24:22,54 you have experienced total darkness but it really brings up what we're afraid of 913 01:24:23,23 --> 01:24:27,29 what the world could be. And this is 914 01:24:27,46 --> 01:24:32,98 a story called fourteen candles which is based on an event that took place in the 915 01:24:32,99 --> 01:24:39,77 sixty's. I was walking the Beagle 916 01:24:39,78 --> 01:24:46,32 in-bound park when total darkness had no street lights house 917 01:24:46,33 --> 01:24:53,26 lights traffic lights the dogs sensed danger and sniffed 918 01:24:53,27 --> 01:24:59,40 the air the full moon became less heavenly and more minutes 919 01:25:00,89 --> 01:25:07,21 my Eastern European neighbors came out surveyed the sky for missiles and warplanes 920 01:25:07,21 --> 01:25:14,06 . Back inside taper candles dimly lit our 921 01:25:14,07 --> 01:25:20,36 kitchen. Scratchy sounding transistor radio described 922 01:25:20,47 --> 01:25:26,42 unexplained power loss for thousands of miles no T.V. 923 01:25:26,85 --> 01:25:32,84 No phone service mom placed her chocolate cake on the kitchen table 924 01:25:33,66 --> 01:25:38,06 fourteen flickering birthday candles make 925 01:25:38,07 --> 01:25:41,91 a wish I wished we knew where dad was. 926 01:25:54,82 --> 01:25:56,16 I don't know if you've ever been in 927 01:25:56,17 --> 01:26:02,66 a situation where. You needed some help because 928 01:26:03,38 --> 01:26:07,61 things had to get done in you weren't up to it for some reason and friends weren't 929 01:26:07,62 --> 01:26:12,44 available you didn't want to pay for someone and some relative throws in the had to 930 01:26:12,45 --> 01:26:19,26 deal well and help. Things don't always work out as well this story is called 931 01:26:19,27 --> 01:26:25,56 volunteer labor. I wrenched my back 932 01:26:26,68 --> 01:26:29,17 so Cousin Basil volunteered to trim 933 01:26:29,18 --> 01:26:36,06 a tree in my driveway and paint my small part of basal chain so 934 01:26:36,07 --> 01:26:42,66 I walked my still white bulldog gumbo down to buy you trail when we 935 01:26:42,67 --> 01:26:43,35 returned 936 01:26:44,08 --> 01:26:50,93 a tree limb had shattered my pickups windshield. I'm sorry A.T.M. 937 01:26:52,57 --> 01:26:59,47 Accidents happen cousin I have insurance no worries go paint the barn my rest 938 01:26:59,48 --> 01:26:59,61 for 939 01:26:59,62 --> 01:27:06,96 a while too high pitched yelps interrupted my cat now I 940 01:27:06,97 --> 01:27:12,81 spotted gumbo splattered by barn red paint hiding under the porch 941 01:27:14,39 --> 01:27:21,21 and basil swatting away bees if to the extension ladder fell onto my 942 01:27:21,22 --> 01:27:27,20 Highers. Hunting with basil this fall oh hell no. 943 01:27:44,86 --> 01:27:49,26 Professors like David helper or evaluating students' work or reading 944 01:27:49,27 --> 01:27:56,17 a lot of material. And. Sometimes hear from people are 945 01:27:56,18 --> 01:28:01,09 very extroverted This is from someone who's very interested it's called Cupid's 946 01:28:01,10 --> 01:28:07,48 coffee in class painfully shy will it be 947 01:28:08,03 --> 01:28:14,43 stole glances at confident articulate Helen writing was his voice 948 01:28:15,59 --> 01:28:21,05 Willoughby's midterm essay like it is unspoken feelings for brown eyed classmate 949 01:28:21,06 --> 01:28:24,25 Helen took poets unrequited love for 950 01:28:24,26 --> 01:28:31,23 a friend one afternoon Helen texted friends by entering that can't this coffee shop 951 01:28:32,15 --> 01:28:34,21 she collided with will be dropped as 952 01:28:34,22 --> 01:28:41,00 a latte I'm so sorry but it's OK he stammered can I buy you another cup 953 01:28:41,20 --> 01:28:47,26 he froze he aren't you in Victorian poetry he nodded 954 01:28:48,29 --> 01:28:51,61 You barely see it word but my mom thinks you're 955 01:28:51,62 --> 01:28:57,02 a brilliant writer mom are Professor M or daughter Helen. 956 01:29:06,54 --> 01:29:09,10 I want you to read something that 957 01:29:09,43 --> 01:29:15,05 a couple of instances have been stories about mothers and this is. A story about my 958 01:29:15,06 --> 01:29:21,00 mom. A lot of times when you see some you figure all you're going to see next week 959 01:29:21,01 --> 01:29:25,93 or next month or and there's sometimes you know it's the last time you're going to 960 01:29:25,94 --> 01:29:27,42 see that person and it takes on 961 01:29:27,43 --> 01:29:34,36 a different meaning so this is called Far ago she was almost ninety 962 01:29:34,37 --> 01:29:35,61 seven in 963 01:29:35,62 --> 01:29:42,61 a nursing home. Her bony hand grasped mine and I recall that moment the final 964 01:29:42,62 --> 01:29:49,56 time I saw her when did you move to northern California What did 965 01:29:49,57 --> 01:29:54,25 she recollect about my leaving Manhattan and going roots in the redwoods thirty 966 01:29:54,26 --> 01:30:00,93 five hundred miles away it's been almost thirty seven years. That was far 967 01:30:00,94 --> 01:30:07,85 ago. As she unified the time space continuum I thought of frost and as Miles to go 968 01:30:07,86 --> 01:30:14,31 before I sleep. Her eyes photographed my face as I leaned down and kissed her cheek 969 01:30:15,60 --> 01:30:22,16 before I closed her door I turned back she smiled and waved thank you very much 970 01:30:22,73 --> 01:30:30,16 thank 971 01:30:30,17 --> 01:30:36,100 you. Thank you 972 01:30:37,01 --> 01:30:42,08 very much thank you all for all of our writers who have to bring them up here thank 973 01:30:42,09 --> 01:30:47,36 you so much for joining us for the story short show here that says the idea of 974 01:30:47,37 --> 01:30:47,86 production 975 01:30:48,73 --> 01:30:55,68 thanks to the First 976 01:30:56,36 --> 01:31:01,55 thank you very very good thank you all for THANK YOU 977 01:31:01,72 --> 01:31:03,46 THANK. 978 01:31:11,21 --> 01:31:11,39 You. 979 01:33:15,47 --> 01:33:18,90 What. Am I.